Dear Editor,
By the time you read this …
The federal election will be over and done and everything will be all right for the next four years. I hope you got just the government that you wanted and all your dreams for Canada will be fulfilled.
Now, next month, we’ll have municipal election campaigns throughout the Pontiac. This is an election that can affect how you live. The municipalities take care of all the hands-on ground-level government, without the need of political parties. If parties ever take over municipal politics, it’s time to quit altogether. Municipal councils have very little leeway in what they do — it’s all just a front for the provincial government — bylaws and codes are enacted in Quebec City and the municipality has to follow the game book. That’s not to say that municipal councils are unimportant — they are, in my opinion, the government that is actually close to democracy. They fix the roads in summer, have them plowed in winter. They maintain and encourage the local firefighter brigades. They collect waste material and see to its being disposed of. These are people you know, they are your neighbours and they are affected by the same issues that you are.
Just so you know, there’s a new issue just over the horizon and this one falls right into the laps of the people themselves, it’s organic waste in the garbage stream. It has to be done differently and that has to be done at a household level. Here’s why, all the problems related to disposal of waste materials are exacerbated by the food waste content. Organic matter, when wrapped in plastic and compressed in a landfill, putrefies and creates stinky sulfurous compounds and methane gas. That’s why we have to pay the workers who have to deal with our crap and we pay big time for the organic content. Organic matter is wet and heavy and we pay by the ton to have waste material hauled away to a landfill which has a limited lifetime capacity. Shipping and handling of that material is bound to increase in cost. We can’t afford to pay what it’s really worth to make it just disappear. The only practical way to deal with it, is to separate it at the household level and have a separate transport system for the organic waste. It should be handled locally, composted, rendered into a yard and garden soil amendment and then resold back to the public.
People who live in the country probably already have an informal compost facility where they can casually toss their kitchen and garden waste into a heap where the worms and microbes have at it until next spring, when it goes back into the garden. City dwellers will have to work out their own systems, already underway in most jurisdictions. Don’t let this slip up on you and then complain about not knowing, you’ll have to figure out a way of collecting the organic waste, and someone who will collect it and deal with it, because we can’t afford not to do so. Look around your neighbourhood, who’s the most enthusiastic gardener? That person may want to collect and compost waste for the area. It’s the future. Don’t say I didn’t tell you so.
Robert Wills
Thorne and Shawville, Que.
